The scene outside the tournament roomThe thing is, this was no break, and Paon had chips in the main. But that didn’t stop him. And he may not have notices all that sunshine stuff I just mentioned. Paon had a different motivation, a need to calm down after a bad beat. Sure, it was risky to leave his seat, but as far as Paon was concerned, it was riskier to stay in it.
It was all because of Christopher Frank. The German had moved all in with eights and Paon called with queens. Frank was packing up his things on the turn, expecting to be out. Instead the eight hit the river.
There were no histrionics on Paon’s part (or Frank’s). All he did was close his eyes for one long blink. When he opened them again they seemed a little pink. He was silent, and seemed to be looking around for someone to tell him it was not real. But it was real, and then his face turned pink.
Was it rage he was feeling? Was it anger, that the baby-faced Frank had just cost him half his stack? Or was he just upset and not keen on letting people see it? Whatever it was he figured it was better dealt with in private. One second he was there, the next he was gone.
It was a brave move, coming as it did only ten minutes from the actual break, and with the big blind now 16,000. Lesser men may have played through, and been gone for good minutes later. Not Paon.
I wish I could tell you that his decision to escape for a few moments had since catapulted him into the chip lead. Well, it hasn’t. But he’s still very much in the running.
So maybe there are some lessons for us all in there: Don’t expect everything to go your way. Bottle it all up if it doesn’t. Don’t cry in public.
And enjoy the sunshine while you can.
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Stephen Bartley is a staff writer for the PokerStars Blog.
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